Jaclyn Blumas of brother/sister trio DOOMSQUAD is a woman open to the world from the perspective of another world entirely. She talks about mystical experiences with a casualness that most people would reserve for a story about a trip to the grocery store. She moves with an airy quality, like a dancer, but with a childlike nature, a wonderful gracelessness. Everything that comes from her mouth is positive. It’s all, “yeah!” and “amazing!”, and she speaks to you directly, you’re her only focus. When she moves away she’s away and somewhere else completely. Her home, which teeters between gypsy comfort and organized mess is warm and well composed. It’s no wonder the music that DOOMSQUAD produces is deceivingly complex. It’s like a hypnosis wheel; from a distance it’s simple and contrasting colours but get close and it’s moving uniform into what seems like infinity.

DOOMSQUAD, comprised of Jaclyn, Allie and Trevor Blumas, formed in 2010, making formal, Carter family-like folk music. They quickly and rightly set their acoustic instruments aside for an electro-journey beginning with their Land ‘O the Silver Birch EP. That trip brought them into their first full length album, Kalaboogie, a reverb drenched and chant filled album with a light touch of pop sensibility, then into their latest Pageantry Suite EP, which is influenced as much by Talking Heads as it is smoke-filled, bass heavy, dark after-hours weekend parties. They’ve toured with Tanya Tagaq and Fucked Up, and their next full length album, scheduled to be released in late 2015, will surely bring them to another level of success entirely.

Jaclyn was kind enough to allow us at Weird Canada to photograph some of the ephemera that keeps her moving forward as an artist and a person and to touch on the stories of what gives her precious objects weight.

They’re all different, some of them are from my roommate’s girlfriend. This one is from my Nanny, we used to decorate it like a Christmas tree. This is a Christmas cactus, this plant turns red in the summer and green in the winter. I don’t know the names of anything. I know how to take care of them though, I move them around until they’re happy.

Found Item Art

My roommate and his girlfriend made this. They make these kinds of things then throw them out but I wanted this. It’s a sardine can, resin, a little chicken and a sun.

Favourite Records

I’m trying to promote the shit out of Roniia. This is one of my favourite records right now. We know these guys from North America and Roniia are friends of theirs, we hung out with them in Minneapolis. They’re so fucking good. They should be playing stadiums, they’ve got it all figured out. Also, This Mortal Coil. It’s a compilation from the 80s, it’s so good, it has these great covers of Kangarooand Song to the Siren.

Alex MacKenzie’s Art

Alex did this for Come Up to My Room, an event I helped organize at The Gladstone. She made a Moroccan tent with this design. When the light changed from blue to red this would pop out and move. It was this active, moving tent. This is a print of that.

We Are All Nuts

Our family cottage was in Calabogie. We ended up saying goodbye to it last year. It’s where we wrote our album Kalaboogie. The cottage was full of things that were important to my grandparents and this was one of them. A little mouse came and ate the peanut out of this nut on the end. It says “We Are All Nuts.”

Roland Keyboard

This was given to me to borrow indefinitely. The person hasn’t asked for it back yet, I’ve had it for seven years. His grandparents had it and he didn’t know what it was. I’ve used it on almost every DOOMSQUAD recording. It’s too finicky to travel around with.

Bowie the Cat

This is Bowie. I got her in Vancouver from a whore house in Surrey, BC. They said she was a boy. All I wanted was a boy cat because all I’ve ever had were girls, so I was like, “Can you please just make sure it’s a boy.” The girl was like, “Girl, I’ve been doing this for years,” she had zit cream all over her face and was like, “it’s a boy.” So for three months me and Bowie were hanging out and I was treating her like a boy. I took Bowie in to get neutered and she came out spayed. The vet was like, “Well, she’s a girl.” I said, “Are you sure?” and they were like, “Yup. We spayed her.” I’ve had her for nine years.

Family Paintings

My grandmother painted both of these. She’s a painter, she has nine fingers. She still paints every day.

Favourite Cassettes

These are the three cassettes I listen to the most. North America, babes from New York. Their music was love at first sight, for me. It’s two brothers who play psychedelic desert rock. Country from Montreal, Beaver Sheppard is the front guy. He’s doing all these amazing new things, it’s like apocalyptico pop music with freaky dance vibes. This Not the Wind Not the Flag is from a live show that they did a few years ago, Healing Power put it out. I was listening to this tape all through a break up, through moving out of a studio space, everything I did that was traumatizing for me and didn’t know how to get through. I would put this tape on and go to another place.